WHEN OLIVIA RETURNED TO THE BRIDGE, Chen and McGregor knew what she doing and who she had been talking to. They all looked at her with bated breath, eager to find out what command had to say about their discovery. Olivia stood there and composed herself, aware that some people were going to hate what had been asked of them. She looked over at another crew member at the back of the room.
“Open a channel to the entire ship,” She called out.
After a few seconds, the crew member nodded back to indicate it was done.
“Crew of the Conestoga, this is Captain Olivia Howard,” Olivia started, as she paused for a moment. “It appears that our investigation has led to what is being considered by the Confederacy as the biggest space discovery in human history. The ship is in orbit of what we believe to be a Dyson Sphere. I have already contacted command, and we’ve been given our orders. We are to observe and chart the Sphere from a safe distance and not make any attempt to contact or enter it. A fleet of recon cruisers and even other explorer ships are going to be dispatched to our region to secure the sphere and investigate it. We will have a chance to participate in that operation as the Sphere is just too big, and I expect recon to request our assistance rather quickly upon realizing how massive it is. So, right now our job is to sit tight and gather as much data and intel as we can before our backup arrives. This is not something to be sad over, but a time of celebration. I am going to make plans with the senior staff and prepare a formal dinner to commemorate our discovery. This is something we can all share in, as this discover belongs to us all. Let’s keep things professional and do our jobs for the Confederacy. This could be the answer to all of our homeland’s problems, and you all know what that means. Our odds of survival in the universe just went up exponentially, and our future just got a little big brighter. Congratulations, everyone.”
Olivia made a hand signal to the officer who opened the ship wide channel, and she knew that that meant and disconnected it. The captain then turned to face McGregor and Chen who were both looking at her.
“That’s it?” McGregor said, “Just stand back and observe again?”
“I’m afraid so,” Olivia said, sighing deeply. “Those are our orders.”
“What are you afraid of?” McGregor asked.
“Hey, that’s not fair,” Chen protested, looking rather agitated by the statement.
“It’s not,” Olivia said as she walked closer, “But he’s right. I am afraid.”
“Of what?” Chen asked, as he could hardly believe it.
“Look at that thing,” Olivia said, gesturing to the Sphere that was before them. “That entity was produced by a species that are far, far more advanced than us. We also have no proof to tell us whether or not anyone is home inside the Sphere. Anyone that is capable of making something this glorious would have no trouble blasting us away with a single shot if we so much as dented their creation. As much as I’d like to also investigate and look around, this situation is much more dangerous than you think. Keeping our distance and letting the recon ships put their lives at risk sounds a lot better to me. I have over seventy crew on board and their safety needs to come first, so we are going to keep our distance and scan the sphere until our backup arrives as ordered. Are we clear on that, people?”
Olivia looked around at the bridge, and everyone standing there nodded to acknowledge their compliance. Even McGregor nodded reluctantly, but he understood her reasoning and agreed that the lives of the crew should come first. Captain Howard continued to stand in the middle of her bridge, as her eyes focused on the screen. Her heart raced, unsure of what they might find inside the Sphere.
After hearing the news from their Captain, the crew of the Conestoga’s crew had been watching the Sphere from their windows with eyes widened with disbelief. The Sphere’s sheer size and complexity seemed to surpass any other object that has been discovered by anyone.
"It's... astonishing," Dr. Mei Chen whispered, her voice tinged with amazement.
“How is this even possible?” Carter asked, as he was going to be in denial for a very long time.
Olivia couldn't help but share her crew's confusion.
“I don't know what’s in there, but it’s not our job to check.” She reminded them all, “We've never encountered anything like this before, and that is exactly why I agree with the admiral has called for caution. We need to treat this as a first contact situation because this is an advanced species that could attempt to interact with us at any moment. I don’t know about you, but the last thing I want to tell the Admiral is that we started another galactic war with an advanced race because we were unable to follow his orders. Do you?”
McGregor was a veteran of the previous galactic war, so that comment hit home with him far more than it did the rest of the bridge crew. Is stood there for a moment and sighed deeply before responding.
“No, don’t want that either.” McGregor concurred, “But do you mind if I make a suggestion?”
“Alright,” Olivia said, willing to at least hear him out. “What is it?”
“The probe,” McGregor started to explain, “We need to recover it and bring it back to the ship. The last thing we want our advanced neighbors here to think is that we fired something at them, like a bomb or a torpedo. If we take it back, they might realize its collision was an accident and not respond.”
“How do we know if there’s anyone in there?” Chen then asked, “There are no lights emanating from it. There was also no response to our probe’s collision. We might need to entertain the theory that there’s no one home.”
“That’s something we can check,” Olivia said, as she walked over to Carter’s station and look right at him. “Lieutenant, are we able to scan the Sphere?”
“It’s not easy,” Carter conceded, “As I’ve been trying to scan past the exterior but there’s a lot of interference. The energy readings are off the charts, and that is blocking any attempt to scan the object for any signs of life. I’m going to try to adjust the ship's sensors so that it can accommodate and look past the overwhelming data, but it’s going to take some time.”
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“Alright,” Olivia said, “Right now our top priorities are to use our other probes to create an orbit around the Sphere, and then we can try to scan inside once we find out how long it takes them to fly around this thing. During that time, your people should have enough time to calibrate the sensors.”
“Yes, Captain,” Carter acknowledged, “We’ll get on it right away.”
“What about the crashed probe?” McGregor inquired again.
“You’re right about that,” Olivia said, angered to be agreeing with him. “Take a shuttle to the surface and recover the probe as quickly as you can. That way we can pretend it never happened if this species tries to contact us.”
“Alright,” McGregor said, smiling at her. “I’ll take a few engineers down there with me and we’ll get that probe back onboard asap.”
“No lollygagging, sailor.” Olivia informed him, “We don’t want his people to be on the surface of the Sphere any longer than you needed to be.”
“Aye, Aye, Captain.” McGregor said before leaving the bridge to get to work.
Olivia watched as her former husband departed the bridge without the usual fuss, though she knew the man enough to know what was going through his mind. He was at heart an explorer as well, which is why he ever agreed to serve onboard her ship out of all he got to choose from in the fleet. There was a part of her that admired his loyalty, and that knew deep down inside the grumpy bastard still cared about her and wanted to be there to show his support. It was a shame that things never worked out between the two, but he was still there to drive her crazy and give the tough Captain a stern reminder to why they were no longer bonded in wedlock. She looked back at Chen who was still thinking about what had just transpired.
“I can tell you’re worried,” Olivia said, taking a step closer to him.
“I am,” Chen confessed, looking back at the mammoth structure that was before them. “We are looking at the most advanced structure in all the galaxy, possibly anywhere in the known universe. The species that built it are far more advanced than we are, and yet they are not making any attempt to contact us.”
“There are plenty of possible reasons for that,” Olivia said, “Like you said before, there’s a chance no one’s home. There also could be something far simpler to consider; we’re too small to be noticed or even acknowledged.”
“What makes you say that?” Chen asked.
“Imagine this thing is a house back home,” Olivia explained, “Based on its size, we are no bigger than ants standing beside it. What would your response be if one of the ants outside tried to knock on your door? Would you even answer it?”
“So, we are too small and insignificant to even both answering?” Chan asked, as he wasn’t fond of the comparison.
“While that does sound cruel,” Olivia continued, “If they think of us as too small to answer, chances are we are also too small to be considered a threat.”
“Oh, that’s a good point,” Chen said, “Because the last thing I want to see is an armed conflict with a species this advanced. We wouldn’t stand a chance.”
“I don’t think we would either,” Olivia said, “Once we remove the probe, we’ll back off to a safe distance and not give them a reason to swat at us.”
“A good plan,” Chen agreed, “As much as I admire and am impressed with this discovery, it kind of gives me the creeps. Especially based on how dark and well hidden this thing is.”
“I was thinking about that too,” Olivia said, looking at it on the screen. “Do you think they did that on purpose, to hide this from people who might try to take it away from them?”
“Maybe,” Chen replied, “Or they just didn’t want people like us seeing it and trying to play around with it.”
“Well, if it creeps you out so much,” Olivia started, “Then maybe you should get back to the infirmary and stop staring at it.”
“A smashing idea,” Chen concurred, “I’ll be down there if you need anything.”
Olivia watched as Chen departed the bridge and disappeared into the elevator at the back. She then turned back to the screen and noticed that McGregor and his engineers were already on the shuttle and slowly flying towards the crashed probe. She was impressed how fast he and his men got going but also knew what that man was thinking at the same time.
“Captain, to shuttle,” Olivia started after hitting a panel on the con. “Don’t lollygag down there. Just get our probe and get off as soon as possible.”
“According to USC guidelines,” McGregor replied, “The first person to set foot on now grounds has the place named after them. So, you might as well start calling it the McGregor Sphere right now.”
“Not so fast, smart ass.” Olivia interrupted, “I already spoke to the Admiral about that, and that rule only applies to natural celestial bodies. This one is artificial.”
“So, what are we calling this thing?” McGregor asked.
“The Admiral already decided,” Olivia said, as she was hoping to save this bit of news when she was addressing the entire crew later in person. “It’s already been classified by the Confederacy as the Conestoga Sphere. So, technically we’re all being credited for its discovery.”
“I can dig that,” McGregor conceded, “But I’m still about to become the first human being to ever set foot on a Dyson Sphere… just so we’re clear.”
Olivia paused for a moment and had no choice but to relent as there was nothing she could do about that. She had hoped to keep this trip to the sphere to retrieve the probe a secret from command, but it turns out McGregor’s ego was not going to let her get away with that.
“Noted for the record,” She finally said, sighing in frustration, “Just get that probe back onboard and back to the Conestoga as soon as you can.”
“Acknowledged,” McGregor said before signing off. She could hear his smile on the com, and it angered her just a bit.
Olivia took a seat and watched the screen as McGregor and his people landed, departed rather fast and got to the probe in a matter of minutes. There was some issue removing it as the probe had gotten pretty stuck, but that easily solved. McGregor and his people broke the probe apart into fragments, and that loosened the probe to the point where it broke free from where it was lodged. In all, it took the grumpy engineer and his people about fifty minutes to removed the probe and get back onboard. Less than an hour was quite efficient, and Olivia let out a relieved deep breath as she watched the shuttle lift off the sphere and start to make its way back to the main ship. There appeared to be no response from the Sphere itself, so they were lucky that the people inside were not bothered by the probe itself, nor their collection of it. Once the shuttle was back onboard Olivia gave the bridge to her executive officer, Commander Jones, and went back to her quarters. She had ordered Commander Jones to contact her if the Sphere did anything suspicious while she was trying to sleep. While she was tempted to speak to McGregor in the hangar and inspect the broken probe, Olivia was going to hold that off for the time being as she didn’t feel like putting up with her ex-hubby’s ego as he was no doubt still bragging about his place in history as the first man on a Dyson Sphere. While she agreed that was something to brag about, she was too tired to try to put up with tonight as she eagerly returned to her quarters to start her daily process of trying to get some much needed shut eye.
As Olivia laid down in bed, she started to stare up at the window that usually had flying stars but that wasn’t the case tonight. It was all black and not a glint of light at all, because her window was facing the mammoth sphere that was blocking her view. As she stared at what was the most enormous artificial object in the universe, something weird did happen. Olivia could feel herself getting lighter, which was odd because sleep never came to her this fast. For the first time in almost a decade, Olivia Howard had fallen asleep in less than a half hour after hitting the bed. While she wasn’t one to look a gift house in the mouth, as she passed out there was no way for her to know that the source of her newfound sleep had come from the sphere itself.